Senior coach Ross Lyon says he has come back to a hard-working and vibrant group on return from his study trip to the US.
Lyon attended a leadership course at Harvard Business School in Boston, and was pleased to see Freo’s newest recruits and draftees fitting in well with the existing cohort.
“I’ve come back and jumped off the plane and walked into a really vibrant, enthusiastic leadership group and playing group and we’re getting back to basics and working hard,” Lyon said.
“We’re really thrilled with the trading period, and we really got the player we targeted with our first pick, a young tall in Griffin Logue that brought height through. We’ve rearranged our coaching staff, there are new roles and everyone’s enthusiastic and so you should be at this time of year.”
Lyon took plenty of perspective from his trip, where he hit the books at one of the world’s most prestigious universities.
“We thought as a club that we’d like to all challenge ourselves a little bit more with some external development,” Lyon said.
“Leadership starts at the top, so as a senior coach it was fantastic to go away for a week at Harvard Business School and immerse myself in the course.
“There were 100 people on the course from all around the world, so to talk with other CEOs, to share their experiences in their leadership and do some intense study, I really enjoyed it - and I think it will be very beneficial personally and professionally.”
While addressing the media at Fremantle Oval on Tuesday, Lyon stressed that the club is on the right track in their preparations despite concerns from off the field.
“I’d like to reiterate, I understand the sensationalism, but I learnt from the course that bad negates good,” Lyon said.
“So you can do 98 good things, but if you do two things that don’t look great human nature is to focus on the bad. But what I’m here to say is that 98 per cent is going right here.”
“They’re vibrant, they’re training hard. Fyfe’s on the track, Mundy’s on the track.”
With hopes of overseeing a full strength Fremantle side in 2017, Lyon stressed that the side can perform well if they get the simple things right.
“We felt like in some areas last season our running was a bit down,” Lyon said.
“And we certainly weren’t available through circumstance as well through injury and we weren’t as cohesive on the field under pressure as we’d like to be.
“When I talk about getting back to our basics, that’s what we’re talking about, and you can see that simplification has made them quite vibrant.”
